the memories stalling in your head
by ncfan
Summary: Kanon has never met Ushiromiya Battler before today. /Spoilers./


I was finally able to get my hands on a copy of the VN question arcs to download (not that far in yet; I only got it earlier this week), and VN-Kanon may be the cutest thing I've ever seen.

I own nothing.

* * *

It's time for the family conference again, which means that Madam is completely ignoring the physical capabilities (or lack thereof) of her servants and Gohda is being even more obnoxiously loathsome than usual. Being a boy, Kanon supposes that he shouldn't mind being set to do physical work out in the garden. It's better than having Shannon or Kumasawa do it, and Kanon knows he ought to be strong enough to cart around a wheelbarrow full of fertilizer, but he just can't…

He just can't do it, and Kanon is left to wonder just what good this body is if it can't even do menial tasks.

And there's a new face, that's not so new.

Ushiromiya Battler, the tall, lanky red-haired boy introduces himself, brightly, almost aggressively asking Kanon his age. Kanon has to pause a bit before remembering to say 'sixteen', trying all the while not to choke on his own tongue.

Battler's changed.

Battler doesn't know him, of course, doesn't know Kanon. Ushiromiya Battler and Kanon, servant of the Ushiromiya family, have never met before today. Kanon has of course heard of him; who hasn't heard of the wayward son of the Ushiromiya family, who has finally come home to roost? Every year that Kanon has been here, it's been all the servants who remember the boy can talk about come time for the family conference: will this be the year Battler-sama comes back?

Battler doesn't know Kanon. He looks at Kanon and sees a slender boy of slight stature, whom he probably just assumes is late hitting puberty, thus explaining his slim body, vaguely feminine facial features and soft, almost falsetto voice. It has been and still is amazing to Kanon, that if a person walks up to you in boy's clothes, uses masculine speech and introduces themselves as a boy, it doesn't matter how feminine their face appears, so long as you can't see prominent breasts or curves, you'll still be inclined to believe them when they say that they're a boy. But perhaps Battler simply isn't as observant as he used to be. Perhaps he's just the sort of person who goes on first appearances now.

Ushiromiya Battler has never met Kanon, servant of the Ushiromiya family, before today, and Kanon has never met him. But in a different life…

No, that's not it.

As a different sort of person, Kanon once knew him. Long ago, as a different person, Kanon knew Battler, knew him very well.

_You don't remember me. Of course you don't; I wear a different palate to your face now than I did then, even a new name. I don't behave to you now as I did then, and it was a long time. You forgot me long ago anyways. Why should I expect you to remember me?_

_Why did you forget me in the first place?_

Ushiromiya Battler is untroubled by phantoms of the past or worries of the present. He is oblivious, blissfully ignorant of everything. He remembers not his playmate of six years ago, the one he would debate mysteries with, the one he'd made foolish (yes, Kanon can see that they were foolish, and ill-conceived, and wonders bitterly why they were ever taken seriously to start with) promises to. Of course he doesn't remember that person, because he forgot, long ago.

And yet…

"_Because we are furniture."_

Kanon looks upon a Battler who has forgotten, a Battler who has forgotten how to peel away at layers of the truth until he finds the one singular truth within. He is not the boy he once was, just as Kanon is not the person that he once was. But Battler is still a kind person, it seems, for all that he's forgotten how to be discerning, not chastising Kanon for clumsiness or a lack of strength when he ends up spilling the bags of fertilizer out of the wheelbarrow, but carrying them for him instead.

_Why did you have to choose this year, of all years, to return?_

This will change nothing, Kanon reminds himself, once he is left alone, for the ultimate result that the person that he once was has settled upon. Battler's presence or absence lost its power to change anything long ago. Kanon hates the roulette, longing to go to the Golden Land the same way he hates how the Golden Land will be found. He can not love, and can not ask another person to love him, for he is furniture. The Golden Land will give him the freedom to love, and better yet the freedom to exist as a fully-realized person, but he loathes the cost, and now loathes it even more.

_If I could have spared just one person, just one to know my story and understand it, it would have been you. And yet it seems that even you will not be spared by the ravaging storm. Ah well. It will cease to matter very soon. Perhaps once we go to the Golden Land, it can be said that you remembered me, or that at least if you did not, you listened to my tale and understood it._

Kanon's eyes linger on Battler's back as he retreats into the guesthouse. A hot, humid wind blows through the rose garden, portending rain as do the darkening clouds above.

Kanon has not met Ushiromiya Battler before today, and has no claim on his time, his attention, nor his affections. Even the person that he once was, a person who _could _claim those things, relinquished those claims long ago. _Maybe once we are in the Golden Land, it can be said that you spoke to him. _There it is, the tempting voice. It never sounds like a witch's cackle, as Kanon might expect it to, but instead like a calm, gentle voice, the soft voice of his sister. _Once we are there, it can be said that he remembered you, and understood._

The roulette is cruel, its methods crueler, and Kanon, resigned though he is to his fate, and his place, knows that he must not listen to any small cries that come from his heart. Still…

_Even I…_

_Even I can feel my heart pounding as my mind fills with memories that aren't truly mine. Even if I can not love, and can not ask to be loved, and that person has long since forgotten me, and it no longer matters anymore. Even I can feel that, sometimes._


End file.
